PHOTOGRAPHS
Hine, Lewis Wickes
U.S. (1874 - 1940)
Spinners in a Cotton Mill
1911
Gelatin silver print
4 5/8 x 6 5/8 in. (11.7 x 16.8 cm) image size; 5 x 7 in. (12.7 x 17.8 cm) sheet size
Joseph and Elaine Monsen Photography Collection, gift of Joseph and Elaine Monsen and The Boeing Company
FA 97.247

Lewis Hine came to documentary photography through his work as a schoolteacher in New York City. He began photographing children at school events around 1901, while working at the Ethical Culture School. From 1907 until 1913, he worked as staff photographer for the National Child Labor Committee documenting the living and working conditions of child laborers throughout the industrial East. Pictures such as this image of filthy, undernourished young children employed in the textile industry were successfully used in the campaign waged by the NCLC and other reform-minded organizations to end child labor in the United States.

-- Label copy for The Photographic Impulse: Selections from the Joseph and Elaine Monsen Photography Collection, July 12 to November 10, 2002.